life on the open road

This Wednesday, tiffkin and I will embark on a six day road trip to the Windy City. No, it does not usually take six days to get to Chicago and back, but we will be stopping in Michigan for a night, and hopefully meeting lots of friends and skyscrapers along the way. We've been planning this for a while, so obviously, we're excited to go.

I've been on a lot of road trips over the years, and we've always found ways to entertain ourselves when the miles dragged on. We had these car bingo games when I was young, and instead of letters and numbers you had to find objects outside the window, such as a tractor, a fire hydrant, a scarecrow, or a windmill. And instead of just getting one row of five, we played blackout, and the winner was the person who had the most covered spaces by the time we got to wherever we were going. I remember one time I spent over an hour looking for a tow-truck, and I found one just as we were coming into Denver. I was so happy ... I had won the game!

I've also listened to more books on tape and sermons than I can remember. If you get a good one, they can really make the miles pass quickly. Get a bad one and they'll put you to sleep.

Snacks are an important part, as stopping at a gas station every hour seems to make the trip last forever. Loading up at a grocery store beforehand is always preferable to scrounging up something along the way. I've also found that big-rig truck stops are easily twice as good as run of the mill gas stations when it comes to selection and customer service. The good ones make you happy to be taking a trip; the bad ones make you wish you'd stayed home.

I've detailed some bad open road habits in another post, but those all happened when I was by myself and in serious need of entertainment. Hopefully this week will be different with some company (and, I might say, a new car). No puppet shows, no Chinese food from a to-go box, no playing catch while driving.

Very happy to be going. Talk to everyone when I come home.

where seldom is heard a discouraging word

A year ago, I was at a family reunion near Vail, Colorado when I heard my grandfather say something most out of sorts. We were in a resort town way up in the mountains, and surprisingly, most of the workers at our hotel spoke Spanish. I tried to go check on the status of my room one day and come to find out, no one on the floor spoke English. They were all a group of young immigrant girls who were there to turn down rooms for a living, and for the most part, they had little reason to converse with guests.

So my grandfather, recognizing this might be his last opportunity to seek the well-being of his relationally sluggish grandchild, decided to seize the moment and equip me to make a move. Now you have to understand that my grandpa is in his late 70’s and is a missionary to Mexico. He has always been a hardworking father of eight, and I have never heard anything even remotely inappropriate come out of his mouth.

You can imagine my surprise then later when he came up and started to outline the basics of picking up Spanish women. He told me how to say, “You are beautiful,” “I once visited Mexico,” and “Can you bring me another towel?”

My grandpa, my dear, sweet, never-harm-a-fly-in-his-life grandpa, was helping me put the moves on Spanish cleaning ladies. This dear, sweet, missionary-hearted man of God gave me a list of phrases in Spanish, and then he said, “And if that gets you to first base, come back and I’ll give you some more!”

Oh grandpa, I hope you’re doing well this time of year. Thanks for your concern of my singleness. Can’t say the phrases did me much good, but I’m still doing just fine.

To everyone else: Has someone you respect as tender-hearted ever really surprised you with something they said?

to have and to hold

tiffkin and I have been on a two week wedding spree recently, and with it has come a rehearsal dinner, two receptions, a first ever pink shirt/tie combo, and a peculiar recognition of several marriage musts . . . well, maybe more like marriage must-nots. I’ve noticed some taboos, lines not to be crossed when nuptiality is on the line. These are things that may fit at another party/celebration, but definitely do not fit in a wedding.

1. showing up in running shorts and yelling out, “Whew! It’s HOT out there!”

2. cutting in on the bride & groom during their first dance (especially if still wearing running shorts)

3. removing bride & groom’s meal at reception and replacing it with a Happy Meal

4. dipping any member of the wedding party . . . for any reason

5. running forward during the ceremony to tell the pastor/priest his zipper is down (or, in case of Levi’s 501 jeans, in need of buttoning)

6. signing false names into the guest registry (which, I’m sorry to say, I’ve done)

7. pouring dirt and/or other unwanted material onto the bride’s car (yep, did this one too)

8. to feed another person wedding cake while he feeds you back (oh man, I’ve done all these)

9. to do anything with the garter belt that even resembles taking it off with your teeth

10. to say to the groom when escorting his bride around the dinner, “I think her sister is prettier.”


Any wedding taboos you can think of?

hold the presses!

I have found a new niche market. Well, it's hardly new, but it's new to me, so I call it new.

The other day, I came home to find recently delivered copy of Men's Health on the table. I think it was a trial issue, as I don't recall having placed an order for such a magazine. These are usually the magazines I tend to avoid: ripped man on front, scantly-clad female at his side, cover littered with headlines such as "Lose that gut now!" and "Schwarzenegger's Secret Shake!" and "20 amazing ways to drive her wild!" I am not exactly for want of any of these hidden gems, so I usually avoid the magazine in whole.

But this time I looked inside, and I must admit, it was kinda cool. There was plenty of the aforementioned excesses, but there was something that caught me off guard. This is a man's magazine. It is not a magazine about men, per se, but a magazine for them. The difference may seem small, but I noticed it (aren't you proud?).

Everything about this magazine reeks of manhood. It is as random and varried yet wholly predictable as the average male mind. The articles are short and easy to read, and they even have the single main point of the article listed in color boldface in case you missed it. On one page, I can learn how to tune up my hot rod, train my body for a triathlon, cook salmon on a grill, hit out of a bunker, and keep my prostate healthy. All of this is on the same two pages! It would be impressive if they kept that chaos going for 10-20 more, but this magazine managed to do it for more than 140! That's impressive.

It's impressive to me because they've truly encapsulated the niche market. It's like, "Yes, someone actually understands a shallow man and can make a magazine for him." I don't know why, but it made me laugh. Most popular magazines have some clear agenda in the material they present: politics, stock prices, computer software, sporting events, clothing, etc. Those things are obviously all niche markets, but how many could boast such a wide array of options as this one? The possibilities are simple, yet surprisingly endless. And who would dare print the same stuff month after month, still hoping to keep their readers interested? Well they pull it off, and for that I salute them.

the real problem at NASA

Today I saw a news article entitled, "Crack Found in Foam on Shuttle Fuel Tank."
Who would have guessed?